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Savvy choices from BMW, Jaguar, Alfa, Porsche, Volkwagen, Ferrari and Aston Martin, with VW Group design chief on the Golf’s secret to success

Pick alternatives to icons and bag bargains, from VW to Aston Martin

Rewarding E-type encounter

I’ve just read Andrew Honychurch’s anecdote (Cool Cat, Hot Property, January 2021) where he remembers Simon Dee’s E-type being driven on the ramp of the Piccadilly Hotel in Manchester – the car was owned by Selwyn Demmy, a Manchester bookmaker. I was a young police constable at the time. One evening while patrolling in Didsbury, Selwyn’s E-type spluttered to a halt in front of me. He had no idea what the issue was so while Selwyn held my helmet I took the distributor cap off which was full of condensation. After I wiped it with his handkerchief, the car fired up and Selwyn shook hands with me before driving away. As he headed off I felt something in my hand the size of a pea – a folded-up five pound note – half a week’s wages! More than 50 years on I have just declared that. John Kay

Talking ’bout Sam’s generation

I know it’s a generational thing, but Sam Dawson is too young to know his pop history. Adam Faith probably the biggest star before The Beatles? (Cool Cat, Hot Property, January 2021). Has he not heard of Cliff Richard? Cliff had seven number ones and 22 top ten hits by the time The Beatles had their first. Faith had two number ones and seven top tens during the same era. Derek Athey

Issigonis’ first?

Richard Dredge’s assertion that the Morris Minor was, ‘The first car to be designed completely by Sir Alec Issigonis’ (Buying Guide, January 2021) overlooks his Lightweight Special, the subject of a two-page article with cutaway drawing by John Ferguson in the 4 June 1937 issue of The Autocar, where Issigonis was accredited as ‘...designer and constructor’.

Moreover, the 918cc sidevalve engine was of pre-war Morris Eight provenance. Prof Peter Fawcett

Pre-production problems

Triumph made no pre-production prototypes (Launch Control, November 2020). There were prototypes and there were pre-production cars. There were five true Stag prototypes, plus the redesigned 2000 saloon styling model that Michelotti produced. Each was allocated an experimental chassis number within the established Xnnn sequence. Three survive.

Triumph planned to make 25 pre-production cars, but because of final changes in design and then industrial action at Speke where the bodies were to be built and trimmed, this plan came off the rails. To ensure that the May press and dealer release and a June public release dates were met, and for there to be cars to sell in June, there was no separation between pre-production and production. Peter Robinson, Registrar, Stag Owners Club